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Leader in Jewish group banned from Labour Party office

Noted Jewish Palestine activist and secretary of left-wing group Jewish Voice for Labour has been banned from holding office in the UK’s main opposition party.

On Wednesday Glyn Secker received a letter from Labour Party officials saying he had been put on “administrative suspension,” citing unspecified “comments made on social media that may be anti-Semitic.”

The letter adds that Secker is now barred from attending any party meetings including Labour’s annual conference.

Speaking to The Electronic Intifada, Secker called it “a direct attack” on Jewish Voice for Labour by the party’s establishment.

Since left-winger and veteran Palestine activist Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of Labour in 2015 in an overwhelming grassroots vote, opponents in the party establishment have waged a witch hunt against left-wingers and supporters of Palestinian rights.

Iain McNicol, Labour’s outgoing general-secretary, has been at the forefront of these efforts.

A key tool in the purge has been a determined effort to smear the party under Corbyn as “institutionally anti-Semitic.” This has involved exaggerated and sometimes completely fabricated allegations of anti-Semitism.

The group called the suspension a “shocking use of unsubstantiated allegations to punish active members of the left without knowledge of charges, on the merest say-so of those who oppose their political stance.”

Jewish Voice for Labour also asked supporters to pass motions in local Labour branches calling for the “immediate lifting of these charges.”

Jewish Socialist Group activist Julia Bard stated on Facebook that Secker is only the latest of many party members who “have suffered from the unjust disciplinary processes” in Labour.

Secker said on Wednesday that both are promising “to reign back this whole campaign of false allegations of anti-Semitism, so they obviously wanted to have a go at us first.”

Secker told The Electronic Intifada he had no idea what he was even accused of, as he is careful about what he posts on social media.

Jewish Voice for Labour is a relatively new network of socialists within the party which supports the right of Palestine solidarity activists to campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, or BDS.

While it includes many veteran Jewish Palestine solidarity activists, it is not an explicitly anti-Zionist organization, rather describing itself as non-Zionist.

Secker said of his many talks, which are often posted on social media, that “I’m always careful to say there are different forms of Zionism. But political Zionism took control of the narrative and it was always about taking the land [in Palestine]. So I argue the politics of Zionism.”

Challenge to hegemony

Since Jewish Voice for Labour emerged last year, it has challenged the monopoly of established Israel lobby groups that claim to speak in the name of Jewish members of the Labour Party.

Last week The Jewish Chroniclereported, citing an anonymous source, that the Jewish Labour Movement’s recent decision to refer “financial matters” to the police does relate to alleged conduct by Newmark.

Comments

This latest suspension is of course an outrage. How anyone can pretend that these suspensions and my own expulsion are anything other than related to defence of Israel beggars belief. Apparently the best way to fight antisemitism is to suspend Jewish anti-racists.

We shall have to see whether or not this is a last throw of the dice by the detested Iain McNicol or not. Now that the Left has a majority on the NEC we shall see if it is prepared to unsuspend Glyn or not. Jenny Formby's record is not good as she has been one of those pushing through references to the NCC on the nod.

Can you be called antisemetic if you're Jewish?
If a black man called another black man derogatory names would he be racialist?
Just wanted to know.
Although I find the suspension ridiculous.
Many members are against the Isreali Zionist government and their colonisation of Palestine.

Glyn Secker is the latest Jewish victim of the Zionists in the Labour Party who are out to destroy Jeremy Corbyn and anyone who criticises Israel's appalling treatment of the Palestinians.

Miko Peled, Jewish writer, Jeremy Corbyn supporter and activist for Palestinian rights will give a lecture at the Quaker Meeting House in Liverpool on Saturday 10th March, starting at 6.30pm. All fair minded people are welcome.

It's beginning to look as though Jews aren't welcome in the Labour Party. I hope that when the nefarious McNicol is finally gone, that the antisemitic strain he represents will have gone with him. At that point maybe Jackie Walker, Tony Greenstein, Glyn Secker and so many others who've been tossed aside can be welcomed back to resume one of the time-honoured practices of Jews down through the generations: opposition to racism and apartheid wherever they arise.

On a related subject, an obscure website has just published another anti-Corbyn smear emanating from the bowels of Israel's Ministry of Strategic Affairs. It's allegedly researched and compiled by someone named David Collier, who claims to be operating on his own with the help of a few others he simply can't name for fear of the danger involved. The document runs to some 250 pages, hardly a one-person, amateur project, and involves trawling for minutiae through a "secret" Facebook account. Hasbara, thy name is desperation. Here's a link.